Any Last Words
by Chesty's Superbest Friend
Summary: AU, 6th year, Dramione. Hermione dies, but her ghost lingers, haunting the halls of Hogwarts. No one knows how to move on. .: "I mean, wouldn't you be confused? Your best friend has just died, but her ghost still roams the halls. Like she isn't really gone. Like she didn't really die." :. Romance/Angst.
1. Haunting the Halls

**A.N. Welcome! I'll let this story speak for itself. The only thing I'll say as preface to it is that I'm planning on it being 6 chapters plus an epilogue. Usually when I write a Dramione, I make it funny because that's my favorite dynamic for them. This one is gonna be a little angsty (and by a little I mean a lot lol).**

 **Please enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter.**

* * *

 **Any Last Words**

 **Chapter 1: Haunting the Halls**

Hermione Granger died last night.

All week, Harry had been convincing her of his suspicions that something bad was going to enter the castle— _Death Eaters, Hermione, I think there's going to be Death Eaters let into the castle_ —and despite her unwavering faith in her school and her headmaster, she also felt the darkness in the air, seeping through the cracks of her hope and trust. Hours she investigated with Harry and Ron, behind their professors' backs, around the corners from their peers, searching, despairing, waiting.

* * *

"Is she still really going to classes?"

"She sat next to me in Potions, and her hand went through mine trying to grab an ingredient. I swear to Merlin I felt a chill."

"You did _not_."

"Did _to_."

"Can she really not remember how she died?"

"She remembers. She just isn't going to grace people like _us_ with her answers. Only her _real_ friends know what happened."

"Harry and Ron aren't acting like they know. They seem sad and annoyed."

"And kinda confused."

"I mean, wouldn't you be? Your best friend just died, but her ghost is still here. Like she isn't gone at all. Like she didn't really die."

* * *

The students and professors were too busy trying to solve the mystery of Hermione's murder to notice Draco Malfoy. They hadn't noticed the deterioration of his physique, hadn't noticed the sallow cheeks, the lack of sociality, the dull expression in his eyes. All these changes happened before Granger died, features and behaviors that only increased in degradation after her body was discovered in the library.

They found her limp against a bookshelf, torso bowed over legs, arms beside her, resting as if she fell asleep, her wand under a pile of books. Cause of death: the killing curse. Her ghostly body would have otherwise looked just like she had in life if she hadn't hit the corner of her study table at some point in her scuffle with whoever killed her, marring the left side of her forehead. Blood poured into her eye and down her cheek.

Another late night studier, a 4th year Ravenclaw, found the body with its ghost sobbing in a nearby corner, blubbering unintelligible words and shaking its head back and forth, back and forth. The Ravenclaw ran until they found a professor, a student, Filtch, anybody. Then McGonagall, the headmaster, and Harry and Ron ran to the library, followed by various students who couldn't help but follow, but feel the death in the air, but know that something terrible happened to someone they knew. Those who didn't follow heard the shout from Ron, heard the sobs from Harry, the screams from them both.

Word spread, and when finally someone thought to seek out to tell Malfoy that one of his childhood rivals was killed, they found him in a dark and quiet corridor, floors and stories and miles away from the library, as far as he could get. He was sitting against the wall, knees to chest, face buried, and when he looked up at the sound of approaching footsteps, whoever found him stumbled away, muttered a spell, and sudden light burned eyes that hadn't opened for a very long time.

"Did you hear?" the Slytherin first year gasped. He ran to find Draco Malfoy, to be the first to tell him. "The mudblood's dead." The first year caught his breath as he waited for the 6th year to answer.

Draco turned from the light and stared at the shadows on the wall opposite him, pulling his knees in tighter. He was so uncomfortable—his joints were taut, begging for movement, for blood flow. He focused on the pain, hoping, as he had all night, that he would go numb eventually.

"I said the mudblood's _dead,_ " the first year repeated as soon as he realized Draco wasn't going to say anything. "They're not sure who did it—think it's an outside job, someone who snuck in with help from the Dark Lord—but personally? I think it was another student."

Draco closed his eyes and swallowed the sound that tried to escape his throat. Maybe a shout. Maybe a sob. He lowered his head, forehead resting on knees.

After a few more coaxing attempts for a response from Malfoy—to no avail—the first year left.

* * *

A week after Hermione's death, the school settled down. Hermione tried to stick to her old schedule. Went to classes, studied, asked questions, answered questions. She asked anybody who was willing to take notes for her and put them in her bag she made Ron carry, but mostly no one agreed. When she went to the library, she would try to get people to open books for her and turn the pages, but no one wanted to do that, either. She settled for reading over people's shoulders, hoping they wouldn't feel too uncomfortable with her hovering presence, but they usually did.

Sighing, she'd prowl the shelves until she found someone so immersed in their book that they wouldn't notice a ghost unless she accidentally gasped in their ear, unless she thought she could turn the page herself and her hand would pass through theirs, and they'd both scream.

* * *

Two weeks after Hermione's death and no one was phased by her anymore. She was just another ghost to some people, and to others, she was just the same old Hermione, except even more annoying than before because she couldn't _touch_ anything and she wouldn't stop asking people to _hand her something_ as if she could _touch_ it.

Harry and Ron, still pestering her for details— _"I told you, I can't remember, there was just a sound and then a green flash, I'm sorry, I really am"—_ started to suspect, just as most students, that it was someone amongst them who killed her and not, as Harry originally thought, a Death Eater at all.

There was no way for someone outside of Hogwarts to enter the school, anyways. He was just paranoid because his scar hurt so often and Voldemort had returned. Harry thought maybe Hermione's death was the first act of war, but no other student had died, no one had found any suspicious persons on the grounds, and no war had started outside yet. Both sides seemed to be biding their time.

If only Hermione could remember _something._ But whenever they would ask, she'd apologize, sometimes seem as if she would cry (that might have just been the blood), but had nothing new to say.

Sometimes, Harry thought she was lying. Sometimes, he thought her eyes shifted to the Slytherin table when he asked. Sometimes, he thought that Hermione didn't care about the living world and its problems anymore, because she was already dead.

* * *

Draco didn't know how nobody noticed. None of his housemates commented on his lack swagger. Not one professor commented on his lack of participation. His rivals didn't snicker when he made a mistake.

And no student, teacher, or groundskeeper mentioned how often he and Hermione made eye contact.

At first, they were involuntary, an attraction to motion. Draco couldn't help that his eyes would follow the new ghost trailing behind her two best friends, a spectacle. But then she would look over, too, and then they'd both flinch and turn away.

After a while, Hermione wouldn't look away when they glanced at each other, and he would stare back, sometimes as a challenge to her, sometimes as a challenge to himself—sometimes because when he looked at her and remembered that she was actually dead, he would feel like he was drowning, suffocating, dying himself, and he would swear that she could tell, that her eyes would soften, that she cared.

And he hated her, he hated her so much for doing this to him, but he couldn't stop staring at her and waiting for her to look back.

* * *

The first words she said to him after she died were, "What are you doing here?" to which he replied, "What are _you_ doing here?"

Hermione scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Come on, Malfoy. It's been a month. Don't you think I should move on?"

"You do seem to spend an inordinate amount of time here, considering this was the scene of the crime."

She sniffed and turned away. Draco sat at the table she was sitting at that night, twirling his wand on the table. No other student wanted to sit there, partly because Hermione would frequent the area, and partly because Hermione died there.

"Yes, well," Hermione said. "Sometimes I feel like I have to be here."

"That's weird." Draco started to twirl his wand again, his heart crashing in his chest. He should leave. He wanted to leave. But he couldn't. He wouldn't.

"Must be a ghost thing," Hermione mumbled, looking at the books on the shelf. "Hey, would you mind grabbing this book for me? I want to reread it."

Draco slammed his hand down atop his wand. Hermione jumped before turning to glare at him. She shushed him, and Draco tried to keep his temper under control. He felt so unstable these days.

After a few deep breaths, he replied, "No." He began spinning his wand again.

"Fine," she grumbled, crossing her arms. She grumbled a few more things Draco only understood half of. He smirked.

"Tsk, tsk, Granger."

"Oh, stuff it. You don't know how frustrating it is to not be able to touch anything. No one wants to help a ghost."

"Why don't you ask your friends for help, then?"

"They're sleeping, Malfoy." She rolled her eyes, and Draco gritted his teeth.

"It's a reasonable time to be asleep, I suppose," he mused, glaring at her before realizing something. "Hey, aren't you pretending to still be a student? Why aren't you haunting your dorms? Did they give up your bed already?"

He watched her deflate. He hadn't noticed how straight and poised her posture was until she hunched her shoulders and turned away from him.

He was going to apologize but the words caught in his throat. He didn't care enough to apologize. He _shouldn't._ He didn't want to. He wouldn't.

After a minute, Hermione, in a soft voice, replied. "No, they didn't give away my bed."

He stared at Hermione's back and she stared at the place her body had been when she died and woke up a ghost.

Draco wanted to walk away then, while she wasn't watching. He wanted to. But he didn't. Hermione continued, "I don't need to sleep, Malfoy. And my roommates"—a hitch, and Draco flinched—" _old_ roommates can't sleep in a room with a dead girl in it."

He frowned. "But you're—" He was going to say _a ghost_ , but then Hermione turned around to look at him with black eyes that used to be brown, blood forever streaming down her cheek, and he couldn't speak, couldn't think, couldn't breathe.

"I'm dead, Malfoy," she said in a dead tone, dead eyes staring at him, dead expression on her face.

She turned and floated away from him—he hadn't noticed that her feet had been planted on the ground until they weren't anymore—and he waited until he thought she was gone before he let out a shaky breath, closed his burning eyes and clenched his shaking fists, waited until he calmed down before standing up and grabbing the book Hermione wanted to read. He stared at the cover until the librarian told him he had to leave, and then he left the book outside the Gryffindor common room before walking back to the Slytherin common room, watching the sun rise through the windows.


	2. Better Off Dead

**A.N. Sorry it's been a while. Have fun!**

 **Disclaimer: Nope.**

* * *

 **Better Off Dead**

Two months after Hermione died and people could almost forget that Hermione was a ghost, she acted so much like her old self.

* * *

"I wish she'd stop asking McGonagall if she can still take the exams."

"I mean, she's _dead,_ what does she have to worry about her future anymore?"

"And she's stuck here anyways, she can just _go_ to the classes."

"At least she's stopped making people take her notes."

"Hopefully soon she'll stop sitting in her old seat and just float around like the rest of the ghosts."

* * *

Draco was going mad.

He couldn't understand why she wasn't telling anyone.

It would help their side if she would confess. If she would just tell. But he knew from eavesdropping on most every students' conversations that Hermione claimed she couldn't remember anything from that night other than a green flash. Sometimes she would tell people she could remember a tall figure, _could have been a Death Eater, I don't know_.

Draco could almost believe that was the truth, except for the way she looked at him now.

* * *

With no whisper of the war worsening on the outside of the castle nor the inside, students started to relax. Harry, Ron, and Hermione couldn't, of course, but they could pretend with the rest of the students that everything was fine while they tried to understand the secrets of horcruxes.

Hermione did what she could to help, of course, but being one physical man down made research difficult: the boys didn't read as fast as she did, but she couldn't hold the books, and they didn't want to turn the pages at her pace because they wanted to understand, too; she couldn't take the notes because she couldn't hold the quill, but Harry nor Ron wrote down enough for her to be satisfied, and they didn't feel it necessary to write more than they had already written.

One such night full of passive-aggressive comments intermixed with frustration had run their tempers a little high, so Hermione left the Gryffindor tower in a huff, hoping to cool her head as she waited for the boys to calm down as well. She haunted the halls, sometimes pretending to walk, sometimes floating until her head almost touched the ceiling, sometimes on her stomach, sometimes on her back. At one point, she thought it might be fun to try just _one_ flip— _can't hurt me, I'm dead_ —and so she twirled, and then she grinned in triumph because hey, she's dead, and then she heard a drawl behind her ask, "What are you doing?"

Hermione squeaked and jumped three feet in the air and then stayed there, a hand on her chest. When she turned to see who it was, she scowled immediately and put her hands on her hips. "What are _you_ doing?"

"I'm walking back to my common room like any civilized wizard—"

"I hardly think a few flips constitutes as _uncivilized_ , Malfoy—"

"Oh, yes, because I often see students somersaulting down the hallways as they make their jolly way to Divination—"

"No one can possibly be _jolly_ to go to Divination—"

"Ah, yes, had nearly forgotten your aversion to tea leaves and crystal balls—"

"You didn't forget, you smarmy git—"

"Come now, Granger, I know you've got better insults than _that_ —"

"You bet I do, but I'm sure they won't mean much to you if I use some _muggle_ insults to try and hurt your feelings, Draco Malfoy."

Malfoy flinched. Hermione couldn't be sure if it was the muggle comment or the usage of his full name, but suddenly they weren't looking at each other with tiny smirks on their faces anymore. Malfoy was turning away from her, taking a few steps back even, and Hermione looked down to realize she had been floating toward him as they bickered, and she was now three feet from his face. She also took some steps back. At a comfortable three-meter-stick distance, Hermione cleared her throat uncomfortably. She meant to change the subject, but when she couldn't think of anything to say, she remembered she didn't owe Malfoy anything and could very simply leave. Just as she was about to, Malfoy turned to her, and Hermione noted now his sunken-in eyes, the exhaustion hanging off his cheeks, the tremble in his hands as they rested by his sides. He did not look good.

Hesitantly, Hermione asked "All right there, Malfoy?"

"No," he snapped at her, but he didn't walk away, and neither did she.

A minute of uncomfortable silence, and Hermione mumbled, "Thanks for my book a few weeks ago."

He nodded curtly but said nothing. Staring at Malfoy fiddle with the bottom of his left hand sleeve, Hermione said softly, "You know, I could help—"

She thought he was going to hiss at her, but he only responded in a hollow voice: "I don't need your help." Hermione nodded, and after another uncomfortable pause wherein she almost left, Malfoy stopped her, asking, "Is that why you haven't said anything? Because you want to _help_?"

"No, I just—" She couldn't imagine what her face looked like for him to be turning his back to her and walking briskly away. She followed, trying to explain. She did want to help, but she was dead, and it was too late—

"Whatever, it doesn't matter anymore. I'll see you around, Granger—"

"No, Malfoy, wait—"

But he started running away from her, and even though she was a ghost and could have chased him forever, she let him go.

* * *

Draco, still moody and broody, was surprised when, the next day, Hermione Granger sat next to him in Potions.

"Lost, Granger?" he drawled, staring at Hermione's perched position in the chair beside him and idly wondering if she had to hold her body above the seat or if she could actually sit in it.

"No," she answered. "Harry and Ron are bit annoyed with me, so I thought I'd give them a break."

"Oh, and you thought sitting with _me_ would be your best alternative—"

"No, I thought it'd be my most _jolly_ alternative—"

"Oh, are we making jokes now?" Draco asked, annoyed at Granger, annoyed at Potter and Weasley for being annoyed at Granger, and annoyed at himself for almost smiling.

"I thought it might be fun if I annoyed you every now and then." At Draco's expression, Hermione giggled. What got her in such a good mood? Maybe she really was looking forward to driving him mad. "Come now, Malfoy," she drawled, "what's the worst you could do to me?" Hermione Granger grinned. "I'm already dead."


End file.
